Microsoft Losing Out on Billions by not developing Office for iOS

Morgan Stanley’s Adam Holt estimated that if Microsoft would develop an office productivity suite for iPad tablets and price it at $60 per license, it would end up making well over $1 billion. In case the Windows 8 maker extends the Office suite to the entire iOS lineup it would end up with $2.5 billion in revenue.

Microsoft hasn’t announcement anything for the iOS platform despite the fact that according to a detailed analysis by Morgan Stanley concludes that the Office 365 maker could end up making a whopping $5 billion overall revenue. Peter S. Klein, Microsoft’s chief financial officer, at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference revealed that they are keeping a close eye on the marketplace and said that there are “lots of things we’re doing to meet that need and we’ll continue to think about other things”, notes PCMag.

Apple takes a 30 per cent cut from each paid app that is sold and Microsoft will have to make room for the same if it starts selling Office for iOS. Microsoft may negotiate with Cupertino on this but in case the negotiations don’t go as planned, a subscription based Office 365 for iOS may be an option for Microsoft.

Hole wrote in his report, “”Microsoft may open up Office 365 to iOS/Android versus making the application native, which may limit the near-term revenue, but would skirt the payment to Apple and drive greater adoption of Office 365, which has significant long-term benefits.”

The reason Microsoft is not looking at an iOS Office suite at the moment is its extensive focus on Windows 8 and the recently launched Surface Pro tablets.